When you have an open role to fill, going to major job boards like Indeed is a logical first step. These websites can help you get your jobs in front of the right people so that you can make a hire. 

In our recent Recruiting Metrics Report, we found that our clients posted 49% more jobs in 2021 over the previous year and with millions of open jobs in the U.S. right now, many business owners are wondering how to increase their visibility on major job boards and make their job postings stand out. 

We collaborated with our resident Indeed expert, Daria Islam, to put together some Indeed posting basics. We’re going to share what you can do to improve your job’s visibility and make the right hires sooner. 

How jobs are posted on Indeed 

There are a few different ways that a job can get posted on Indeed. Of course, employers can post jobs directly on the website. These are called “hosted jobs” and in this instance, all applicants will stay inside of Indeed. 

Additionally, “aggregated jobs” are job postings that are already out in the world that get picked up by Indeed. For these, Indeed works like a search engine, scraping corners of the internet to find them. 

Lastly, third party or “indexed jobs” is when a job posting is sent to Indeed through another source. This is how an ATS like CareerPlug distributes jobs to Indeed.

However your job is posted to Indeed, there are certain guidelines that can ensure it shows up on the feeds of your target job seekers. Let’s go over best practices for Indeed job posting. 

The four basic components of every job posting  

To get accepted by Indeed, every job posting has to have the following four components. These may seem straightforward and obvious, but let’s talk a little bit about how to optimize each of these components to improve your job postings’ visibility. 

1. Description 

When writing your job posting, it’s important to get very detailed in the job description. This helps the right job seekers find your posting. Additionally, a thorough and accurate job description can also save time further down the funnel as it helps applicants determine if the role is right for them earlier in the process. 

Think about what the applicant will be doing and the kind of experience you want them to have. Make sure to build out your qualifications section so that your job posting is targeted towards people that have those qualifications on their resume – the more specific, the better. 

Crafting a great job description is the first step in getting the right people on your team. CareerPlug’s Senior Director of People, Natalie Morgan, shares some of our best practices in this video:

2. Apply method

Your Indeed job posting will also need an application method. One option is “Indeed Apply” which applicants can do without leaving Indeed. This allows job seekers to upload a resume and to send it to employers with just a few clicks. Additionally, you can include an “apply URL,” where the applicant would be redirected to your website or careers page or their application would go to an applicant tracking system like CareerPlug. 

It’s a good idea to include pre-screen questions in your application that help you weed out unqualified candidates, but you’ll want to find the sweet spot where your application isn’t too long. If your application requires people to upload a resume and also re-type that same information into a long application, you’ve already deterred some potential candidates from applying. 

3. Location

All jobs on Indeed must include a city and state, as location is usually a part of a job seeker’s search queries. Indeed recently added an option for remote jobs, but still requires employers to input a physical location as well. For example, CareerPlug is fully remote, but since the company is based out of Austin, we would also include Austin, Texas as a location in job postings. 

This can be a good thing for remote employers as it can actually give you double visibility, meaning you’ll show up on Indeed feeds of job seekers searching for both “remote” and whatever city you’re located in. 

Pro tip: If you are hiring in a small town and not seeing many applicants, consider using the location of the closest, large city. This can help you increase your visibility by showing up in more searches. 

4. Title 

Your job title is incredibly important and should aim to match the words that job seekers are typing into Indeed. Use clear, concise, and straightforward names instead of creative job titles like “coding ninja” or “marketing guru”. 

If you’re not totally sure what to title the position you’re filling, search for similar jobs on Google and see what other companies are titling their jobs. 

Job posting do’s

Here are a few more job posting do’s to get more visibility on job boards like Indeed: 

• Include compensation. This helps job seekers self-select in or out and is becoming more and more common as pay transparency gains traction. Trust us, it’s a good look! 
• Highlight benefits. In a job seeker’s market, it’s more important than ever to entice job seekers with the right benefits. Include the standard benefits you offer, and spend some time thinking about the creative benefits your employees receive as well. Birthdays off work? Free lunch every Wednesday? Let job seekers know! 
• If you’re hiring for multiple roles, make sure to create a posting for each unique position and location. Each job posting needs to be for just one opportunity. (Avoid hiring in “career fair” style or for multiple positions on one job posting.)
• Keep your posting mobile friendly since nearly 70% of applicants apply from their phones. Limit your posting to three to five prescreen questions and avoid open-ended questions. 

Job posting don’ts 

Now let’s talk about what not to do. The following can hurt your job’s visibility on Indeed and even get your job posting flagged and removed. 

• Avoid spammy titles. As previously mentioned, your job title should be clear and straightforward. Don’t advertise a sign on bonus in your job title or use phrases like “HIRING URGENTLY”.
• Don’t use discriminatory language. Avoid gender-specific job titles. For example, use “server” instead of “waitress”. Also avoid anything the EEOC (Equal Employment Opportunity Commission) would see as coded language for discriminatory hiring practices such as “must live within city limits”, “must be currently employed”, “no criminal record”, and “recent graduate”. 
• Although having a background check in your hiring process is a good idea, don’t include language around background or fingerprint checks in your job description. Indeed will likely flag these postings in order to stay compliant with cities/states that ban criminal-history based job discrimination.
• Don’t include too large of a pay range. A gap of $30-40,000 can appear to be unrealistic and not truly represent what most people in the role are likely to make. It is best to think about what most people in the role make on average and include an absolute minimum. Try to give job seekers an accurate and realistic salary range.

Organic vs. Sponsored jobs

One obvious method for boosting the visibility of your jobs: pay to sponsor them. Organic jobs are posted for free. These jobs are placed based on keyword relevancy, then by chronological order. Because of this, they fall further down the search results as they age. 

Sponsored jobs are paid to post, based on a daily or monthly budget, and Indeed gives them “premium placement” in search results. This gives job postings additional and longer visibility, which can be a great choice if you need to fill a role urgently or are having trouble finding applicants. 

Diversify your applicant sources beyond the job boards

It may surprise you to learn that although major job boards produce the highest quantity of applicants, they actually only account for less than half of hires overall. 

According to our research, some of the best sources of hires are employee referrals and custom or niche sources. While doing all of the things we discussed above will help your job postings get more visibility, make sure you’re not solely relying on job boards to fill your open roles.